Senior Software Engineer Autonomous Pilot Integration
Shield AI is a U.S. defense-technology company developing mission-autonomy software and autonomous aircraft for military and allied operations.
Funding history
Investors
About Shield AI
Founded in 2015, Shield AI builds Hivemind autonomy software and V-BAT and X-BAT aircraft for operations in contested, GPS- and communications-denied environments. Its current site also presents Aechelon synthetic-reality simulation and Vision Systems detection and tracking products.
Skills
Candidate Availability
Required and preferred rules are kept separate and reflect the wording in the original posting.
About the Role
You will develop and integrate autonomy software for air, maritime, space, or effects platforms. You will configure onboard compute, sensors, and command-and-control interfaces; validate mission-ready systems; support live operations; diagnose integration issues; analyze mission data; and improve deployment tooling and reliability.
Requirements
- Bachelor's or master's degree in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Aerospace Engineering, a similar field, or equivalent practical experience
- At least 5 years of related experience with a bachelor's degree, 4 years with a master's degree, 2 years with a PhD, or equivalent work experience
- C++ proficiency and experience with real-time or latency-sensitive systems
- Linux-based development, embedded systems, shell scripting, and system diagnostics
- Familiarity with autonomy or robotics middleware, pub-sub, or IPC frameworks
- Experience supporting field or mission tests for unmanned or autonomous systems
- Experience with autonomy simulation environments
- Ability to troubleshoot and optimize full-stack system performance
- Ability to obtain a SECRET clearance
Responsibilities
- Develop and integrate autonomy software onto unmanned platforms
- Configure payload computers, container deployments, onboard compute, sensors, and command-and-control interfaces
- Collaborate with autonomy, perception, feature, and external integration partners
- Build, configure, and validate mission-ready systems
- Support flight tests, range exercises, on-water trials, and integration events
- Diagnose and resolve autonomy-stack, payload-computer, and embedded-system issues
- Profile memory, CPU, and timing under operational loads
- Capture mission data, reproduce issues in simulation, and drive fixes
- Build tools and processes to improve integration and mission reliability
- Implement and validate A-GRA, UCI, and OMS compliance
- Travel 10–20% for offices, customer sites, and integration or test events
Benefits
- Bonus
- Equity